Q is for Queens
by IvyNyx
Summary: Evie absolutely refuses to be Mal's maid of honor. Mal has a brilliant (insane) idea to save the event!


I don't own any of the recognizable places or characters. This story is part of a series that is called Descendants A-Z and is cross posted (always under "IvyNyx").

A/N: Okay, I am naturally an offensive person (exact words are usually "apathetic bitch"). However, I tried to write this in a non-offensive way. If you're offended I'm sorry, but it's just a fictional story about fictional characters in fictional situations.

* * *

"I have an insane idea" Mal said.

Her, Ben, Jay, Carlos and Evie were sitting on a blanket in the park, trying to iron out the last details for her wedding to King Ben. Evie had refused to be the maid of honor, which surprised everyone. She was helping to plan it and was making everyone's outfits but she didn't want anything to do with being in the wedding.

"You've been insane as long as I've known you" Jay offered with a smile.

"This is really insane. Remember for Halloween Carlos had the bright idea to wear a dress." She ventured

"Yeah, I won't be forgetting that anytime soon" Jay smiled, his boyfriend looked better in a dress than most girls did, unfortunately he didn't wear them often.

"I look good in a gown, where is this going" Carlos asked, he had a hunch but he didn't think even Mal was that crazy.

"We'll, with Evie refusing I need a maid of honor, or horror as I've come to think of it. You look good in a dress, you see where I'm going with this?" Mal said.

Carlos started laughing, "You want me to be your maid of horror, complete with dress for your wedding that will be one of the most talked about events, ever?"

"Well when you put it that way it sounds even more insane, but yes." Mal said.

"Jay still the best man?" Carlos wondered aloud.

"Yep" Jay told him.

"I'll do it."

Mal's jaw dropped, "Seriously!?" she yelled.

"Sure, it sounds fun." Carlos said, "you're okay with this?" Carlos shot at Ben.

"Mhmm, whatever makes Mal happy. Besides I am dying to see the headlines" Ben chuckled, he was quickly working through outdated legislature for the LGBT community. The media was having a field day guessing at _why_ he felt the need to do so, they didn't like his given reason that everyone deserved to be equal. Maybe they'd like his one of his wives best friends in a dress better.

"What color dress am I making?" Evie asked her sketchbook open in her lap, her hand poised over a box of colored pencils.

"Oh fuck" Carlos whined

"I'm stuck in blue, Mom did yellow, how about red? Primary colors so it ties in with theirs and it's a color I've actually seen him wear" Ben joked, Carlos still lived in black, white and red.

Evie held out a handful of pencils in varying shades of red, "pick one".

Ben paused for a second before grabbing the blood red pencil, Mal nodded and Evie grabbed it to start sketching.

"Any particular scars you want covered?" Evie asked, knowing she usually got free reign as long as certain scars were covered.

"Nope, show 'em all for all I care." Evie raised her eyebrows, that was a new answer.

"My dress shows my dragons" Mal admitted, I sort of wanted to remind everyone I'm not like them.

"Exactly" Carlos agreed. Evie caught on and flipped to a new sheet, this time she sketched the dress to be spaghetti strap. In a minute she passed around the drawing of a basic a-line dress that would fall just below Carlo's knees.

"Aww I can't wear sneakers in that" he whined when he saw it.

"Like hell!" Mal said "wear those" she pointed at his feet, "and fuck anyone who doesn't like it".

Jay laughed, "in that case, I hate the idea, absolutely loathe it" he joked.

All of them dissolved into giggles.

"Really I can wear my sneakers?"

"Well you do walk quite well in heels, but sure wear sneaks"

"Why don't we all wear sneakers?" Ben asked.

"Because it's a royal wedding?" Mal asked.

"Screw it, you've got a maid of honor with a penis, I think people will over look sneakers. And if not, screw them, it's not their wedding."

Three months later Mal was on the verge of a meltdown. Carlos was trying to get her into her dress, she had suddenly decided she hated it and wanted her dragon mark covered.

"Mal, fucking chill. Once you're ready if you still want it covered I'll put make up on it."

"But what if it rubs off, or something?" Mal asked.

"Damn woman! No wonder Evie didn't want this job." He whined while zipping the dress up. "There you look gorgeous, now shut the fuck up so I can do your hair."

"What does my mouth have to do with my hair?"

"If you don't keep quiet I'll be tempted to shove your hair into your mouth" He said while laughing.

"Okay, okay. Just hurry up, you still need to get changed"

"I will take next to no time" Carlos tole her while pinning her purple locks up using special clips adorned with little skulls.

"Done, now for me" he grinned while ducking into the next room. He yanked the dress off the hanger and pulled it on. He laced up his sneakers and ran a brush through his hair.

"Ready to rock this shit?" He asked walking back into Mal less them five minutes later.

"Can I put eyeliner on you please?" Mal said trying to copy his puppy dog eyes.

"Wow you suck at that look." Carlos laughed, she let her eyes flare to glowing green, "how about now?"

"Gimmie, I can do it. And not because of your eyes!" he said.

She handed him the pencil and watched in fascination as he put it on. "Shit you're better at that than I am."

"Wore it more than you, I promise" he smirked and tossed the pencil down before peeking out the door.

"We should be getting dragged out any minute now.

As if she'd been called, Evie stuck her head in, "You're on Captain".

Carlos laughed and offered his arm to Mal, they'd thrown the traditional procession out the window. Jay and Ben waited at the alter while Carlos and Mal would walk down. Jay and Carlos had the rings and Mal said if anyone threw mutilated flowers she would scream. She grabbed her bouquet with a smirk, it was twelve roses, six had been dyed blue, six were red. She'd taken great care to dry them out though so they were thoroughly dead. Looping her arm through Carlos's she smirked, "lets do this shit!"

As predicted the section of media hounds about lost their minds, this was not what they'd planned on reporting. Their queen to be stood before them in a gown that looked all the world like a fairy tale wedding gown, except it was black as night. Sure it was decorated with thousands of tiny glittering rhinestone diamonds, but it was not what they expected. Her hair was adorned with glittering blue skulls. In her hands was a bouquet of clearly dead flowers. Photographers took pictures and journalists tried to formulate away to report this that would appeal to everyone. The most shocking part was the soon to be queen's maid of honor. _He_ walked tall next to her in a gorgeous red dress, some of the more elderly reporters looked faint. The younger however loved seeing the level of acceptance Ben had, to the point he'd allow someone to cross-dress in his wedding.

Mal took Ben's hands and Carlos stepped off behind her with a careful twirl to make his skirt flare up. He knew he'd be seeing that photograph in the papers in the morning. From there the ceremony progressed in a disgustingly traditional fashion, right down to the kiss and announcing them as husband and wife. Ben and Mal walked out hand in hand, followed closely by Jay and Carlos. The four of them routed to an anti-chamber where they were going to give a short span of time to the press to answer questions and give them ammunition for the articles they would no doubt write tonight.

Ben wrapped his arm around Mal, Mal held him and Carlos. Jay was on the end holding Carlos and Evie had appeared out of nowhere to stand on Ben's other side.

"Who made your outfits!" the first reported yelled out.

Ben hid a smile, "The talented young lady with the blue hair, Evie, she makes most of our clothes at this point."

"Are you happy you married an Isle kid?" another yelled.

"Dunno if I'd call her a kid" Ben said with a chuckle, "but yes I'm glad I married her."

"What's that tattoo on Mal's shoulder?" a younger reporter asked

"It's a magical birthmark" Mal told them

"Can you turn so we can get a better picture of it?" another faceless voice asked

Mal sighed before turning her back to the crowd showing off her mark.

"What's up with the gentleman in the dress?" a middle aged man asked.

"That's my maid of horror. My maid of honor was too busy making clothes, so the job fell Carlos." Mal said

"and the dress?" a young girl near the front prompted.

"Doesn't every maid of honor wear a dress?" Carlos said with a small smile. No one had anything to say to that.

"Any more questions?" Ben asked.

Silence answered him, he was surprised no one asked about Carlos's scars, especially since Mal's mark had come up. With a wave the four of them turned to leave. Next up was half a million pictures.

Two hours later the teens would be happy if they never saw another flash. The reporters had thinned out, leaving behind one girl with bright red hair and the wedding photographer.

"I'm done here" the official photographer said, "the rest of my photos will be the reception." He walked off towards the hall that was housing the festivities. The girl with red hair finally stepped forward.

"Mary DunBroch, Mum is the head of Brave Magazine".

All four teens looked mildly surprised, Brave always ran articles on acceptance and inclusion. All five of them read it on occasion.

"What can we help you with?" Ben asked, knowing she must want something specific since she was still here.

"I was hoping to do a piece about the maid of horror as you're calling him. Every outlet in Auradon will cover the wedding, I figure we could be a little different."

Ben smiled, "That's up to Carlos, I don't mind".

"I'm okay with it, maybe we could meet up after the cake cutting and such. If I hear Jay's stomach one more time I may scream." Carlos said with a small smile to his boyfriend.

"I can wait, thank you got agreeing, I don't quite have my mothers bravery."

"Only takes a minute of being brave to succeed, ask Mal, she about freaked out before she got to the aisle." Carlos said.

Mal laughed and shoved him playfully.

"I'll go join the others, I'll come find you as things die down." Mary said giving them a small wave.

"She seems nice enough" Jay said.

"Yeah, from what I've heard shes like her mom, stubborn and independent but nice. Actually if she was a bit evil she'd be a red headed Mal." Ben said with a laugh. Mal hit him too before marching off to the building, her friends on her heels.

As the festivities started to wind down Mary reappeared.

"Jay wants to come along to make sure I don't make an ass of myself"

"That's fine" Mary quickly agreed, they lead her to a side room that looked to be a meeting room. Carlos quickly sat on the floor, pulling his dress around his knees, Mary started laughing.

"I have never seen someone sit on the floor in a ball gown before"

"He was doing back flips in one on Halloween" Jay said sitting next to his friend. "Feel free to take a chair, Isle kinda made us use to the floor"

"You guys seem to have adjusted really well." Mary observed, sitting on the floor across from them.

"We did, after a long day of being adjusted though, its nice to do something familiar" Carlos said.

Jay nodded along.

"Okay, I don't want to keep you here all night, can you tell me how you ended up as the maid of horror?"

"Process of elimination. Evie is Mal's best female friend, Jay is the best male one. Evie didn't want to be in the wedding because she's over worked from making outfits. Jay was Ben's best man, and quite frankly looks awful in a dress. That left me. I wear dresses once in a while, like on Halloween. So Mal went with the logical choice and asked me." Carlos summed up the story.

"Okay, sexual orientation and gender?" Mary asked

"Gay, male" Carlos said without missing a beat. Jay was trying to figure out how the hell that mattered. Carlos saw his confusion, "It's an inclusive magazine, sometimes guys prefer to use they rather he" Carlos told him without missing a beat, sometimes the internet was helpful.

The questioning continued for another twenty minutes before Mary wrapped it up. "You think Mal would pose with you for a picture or ten? I'm thinking something along the lines of the Queens of Auradon for a headline"

Carlos felt his face break into a grin "I think she'd be willing, Jay you wanna get her?"

Jay stood up, absently ruffling Carlos's hair as he left.

"Do ya think maybe we could pose sitting on the floor? I know Mal won't mind"

"That would be awesome, I have one in mind already" Mary smiled. Mal came in and took pictures with Carlos before going back to her husband, she told Jay and Carlos bye since she was leaving for a week on her honey moon and wasn't sure she'd see the two boys again before she left.

Mary surprised Carlos by hugging him before she left, "thank you so much for meeting with me. I still can't believe no one else tried for this story"

"Oh I'm sure many will write similar things, but yours will have facts." Carlos grinned.

Three days later Carlos found a copy of Brave on the dining room table a note on top of it.

 _Carlos,_

 _Thank you again, here's a copy for you. I hope you like what I've done!_

 _~Mary_

Carlos looked at the cover and laughed. Him and Mal were sitting on the floor, with their legs out straight, arms around each other. Mary had laid on the floor to take the picture so that the bottoms of their sneakers were very obvious in the picture, the headline declared "The Queens of Auradon" in large letters. Carlos flipped the magazine open to page three and grinned. The article had been printed over another picture, he was giving Mal a piggy back ride in this one. In the bottom corner there was a smaller picture of the back of Carlos's shoulders.

 _Everyone was excited for the official wedding between King Ben and Queen Mal. As the event occurred it was clear there was another kind of queen at the event. Mal's maid of honor, or maid of horror as they jokingly labeled the position was filled by one of her best friends. Carlos is another of the kids from the Isle of the Lost, best friend of Mal and Evie, boyfriend to Jay. All four of these kids have overcome the odds to become amazing young adults, but sitting in an interview with Carlos and Jay offered new insight into the kinds of challenges many of us would never think of._

 _Mal's birthmark was a hot topic of the wedding. Carlos revealed that she'd wanted to display it as a reminder of what they had over come together. For that same reason he had Evie design his dress to show his scars. Those in the audience of the royal wedding noticed the scars on the boy in the red dress, however even at the press conference no one had the guts to ask about them, or perhaps that was decorum._

 _In our private interview I inquired, Carlos was happy to answer, telling me he'd prefer the real story to be written than wild speculation. The scars across the back of his shoulders, which spell out the word worthless, as seen in the picture. Speculation has created some fantastic rumors of how these scars came to exist from heroic battles through back alley fights. The real creation of these scars was at his mothers hand, in an argument many of our readers have had. When he told his mother he was gay this was her 'punishment'._

 _Despite everything he has been through he stood by his friend at her wedding, his scars on display along side her mark. When asked he told me "if I keep hiding, she wins". It's a lesson all of our readers should take to heart. It's never too late to stop hiding. Standing tall with the Royal Queen of Auradon was another queen of Auradon, a young man who didn't let any one stand in his way of being there for his best friend, in a stunning dress and comfortable sneakers._

Carlos smiled as he read the article, it was perfect. He'd been getting more than a little pissed at some of the articles that assumed where his scars came from. So many people hadn't asked the important questions then made things up. Mary's article would put them in their place very nicely. Jay come down and Carlos tossed him the magazine, "here ya go my king". Jay was about to ask him what he was smoking when he read the headline and laugh, "holy shit she actually used it!"

"Of course she did, it's brilliant!" Carlos said while he went to make breakfast. No matter what had happened in the Isle his life had the happy ending he'd always dreamed of, maybe, just maybe it was better than he'd ever dreamed.


End file.
